The latest US unemployment figures, announced on Friday, showed an unexpected jump to almost 7 percent, the highest in the last 14 years. Soon America’s unemployment rate may reach European levels. This clearly illustrates that what the country is facing is no longer just a financial meltdown or a crisis on Wall Street. The real trouble now is on Main Street and with the real economy. As growth turns negative, consumption falls and unemployment rises, the economy will enter a long recession. Welcome to the White House, Mr. President? You have inherited the worst economic environment since the end of World War II. If you think this is bad enough, just look at the foreign policy front. No wonder President-elect Obama treaded carefully on Friday when he was asked at his first press conference about the unusual letter of congratulations that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad sent him -- the first time an Iranian leader has congratulated the victor of a US presidential election since the 1979 Islamic revolution. “Iran’s development of a nuclear weapon, I believe, is unacceptable,” said Obama. “And we have to mount an international effort to prevent that from happening.”
Bush will be leaving his successor an extensive list of foreign policy nightmares. In addition to two unfinished wars -- Iraq and Afghanistan -- the Obama administration will inherit three major challenges: Iran’s nuclear weapon dossier, North Korea’s nuclear arsenal, and stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. During his campaign, Obama pledged to remove most US combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of his inauguration. But he was also careful to leave himself some flexibility in order to reconsider this calendar if the facts on the ground warranted a different policy. “We have to be as careful in getting out of Iraq, as we were careless in getting in,” Obama wisely said several times during his long campaign.
New presidents usually want to start with a clean slate and display their change from the previous government. Eight years ago, when President Bush took office, he took this tradition to an extreme with his “ABC” -- anything but Clinton -- policy. For instance, President Clinton believed he was close to a missile deal with North Korea and nearly traveled to Pyongyang in his final weeks in office. But when Bush arrived in the White House, he quickly rejected Clinton’s approach and adopted a confrontational stance against North Korea. Similarly, Clinton took the Middle East peace process very seriously, but Bush opted not to make a serious effort at a peace agreement until much later in his second term. President Bush began what is known as the Annapolis process only last year and the White House, this week, formally gave up any hope of achieving a peace accord between the Israelis and Palestinians within the next two months.
During a visit to Israel in July, Obama said he would not wait “until a few years into my term or my second term” to seek a peace deal. This suggests that he may appoint a high-level Middle East peace envoy, freeing his secretary of state to concentrate on other issues. On North Korea, Obama will inherit a much worse situation than what Clinton left for Bush. In a dramatic change in approach during his second term, Bush avidly pursued a deal to end North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs. But the effort nearly collapsed this fall, before Bush agreed to remove North Korea from the State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism. During the campaign, Obama criticized Bush for taking so long to engage with North Korea. He suggested he would be eager to find ways to keep the disarmament process alive. But the new Obama administration will probably face some its toughest challenges of the diplomatic process concerning Iran. The painstakingly assembled coalition of six nations -- Britain, France, Germany, Russia, China and the United States -- to negotiate with Iran won approval for three UN Security Council resolutions to place sanctions on Iran. Yet Tehran is not easily intimated and appears to continue uranium enrichment.
During his campaign, Obama offered to conduct direct talks with Iran, a statement that undermined current European efforts and strengthened Iran’s hand. There is now speculation in Washington that a grand bargain between Washington and Tehran may be the next thing to consider. This would certainly require integrating Iran in the Middle East process. Time will only tell if Obama will adopt an “ABB” -- anything but Bush -- approach.
